KLC's Proudest Achievements
Ryan and Donny take a moment to reflect.
It takes a lot of work to become the definitive kings of an entire industry, and Ryan Stegman and Donny Cates have done their fair share. In this “minisode” of Ryan and Donny’s Half-Assed Substack Podcast, the guys take a moment to look back on their booming careers to discuss what they believe to be their proudest achievements as comics industry professionals. Check it out!
Donny Cates: Hello, and welcome to yet another of these things that our producing partners make us do. This one's called, as they all are, Half-Assed Substack Podcast minisode. And today, we're talking about things that we're proud of. This is a very difficult topic for me, because I hate everything that I do. But Ryan, do you like things?
Ryan Stegman: ...No.
Donny: Yeah, right?
Ryan: I guess I'll be the most proud when I have a creator-owned book on the shelves, which I'm working on now. Other than that, my career has been pretty miserable.
Donny: Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Especially the last like, five years or so. Something like that?
Ryan: Yeah, no, I'm trying to think if I've got anything good for this, I feel like I had something.
Donny: I have a thing. I do have a thing.
Ryan: Okay, go for it.
Donny: I am so- and you know this about me, Ryan- I take so little pride for my own work. I'm proud of the work that we did on our [Venom] run and everything like that. But it's not something that I sit around and appreciate. I'm very bad at the smelling the roses kind of thing.
Ryan: It's always about what's right in front of your face.
Donny: Yeah, I'm always going 90 miles an hour forward, I don't have any time to look backwards. That being said, there was a moment when I was in Florence, Italy. And I was in this gorgeous suite. It had it's own private balcony that looked over the water and it was... I am going to get a little emotional. I had gone out there and I was having breakfast, as they brought us breakfast, and the sun was coming up. The clouds were all beautiful and everything. I was having a cup of coffee and I was just very quiet. And I was looking out over everything. And then Meg woke up, put on a robe and she came out there and put her arm around my waist and we clasped hands, because we had just gotten married, like three days before that. We got married in Italy and then we were on our honeymoon. I was looking out and I just looked out on this beautiful scene like halfway around the world. As I looked out I said, "Venom. Venom did this. That... is pretty fucking cool." This character that I loved so much as a kid and did sculptures of to get me to art school. And there I met all these people that got me into the industry, which is the industry that gave me all of my best friends in the entire world, including you, and then gave me my beautiful wife and has taken me across the world and stuff. Yeah, in that moment... in that moment, I was really fucking proud. I was really fucking proud.
Ryan: Alright, so one day I went into my kids school. So my children, they've grown up with me doing comic books for a living and, I think I've said it on the show before, but I'm pretty sure they think that just everybody's dad does comic books. And one day, I went into their school when Harrison was in kindergarten and Oliver was in third grade. I did a talk for the school where I you know, drew for them or whatever. Each grade would come in, and my boys got to stay with me all day while the other kids came and went. After Harrison's class came, he went back into the room and his classmates mobbed him like he was a celebrity. So then both of the kids thought it was pretty cool. And it was like the first time they kind of understood what I did, and so that was a proud moment where they realized that, you know, their dad does something kind of neat and that they're into it. There you go.
Donny: That's awesome.
Ryan: *cries*
Kids Love Chains. And we love you.
